luis fernando sotelo

Editor’s note:Luis Fernando Sotelo was arrested in Mexico City in November 2014 after a protest for the disappeared students of Ayotzinapa. During the demonstration, a Metrobús station and a Metrobús (a rapid transit bus service) were burned. After nearly two years of proceedings, he was sentenced to 33 years in prison in September 2016. Following an appeal, he was resentenced to 13 years. He has since been resentenced again, as he explains below.

To those who resist the strategies and apparatuses of capitalist power.
To the compañeras of the world who rebel and refuse to accept forms of domination.

Turning my attention to the reciprocity that I believe is the foundation of true revolutionary solidarity, I wish to share a chapter of my life, reflecting even behind the prison bars, here in front of the desks of the judicial system, the arm of the state, where the defense of freedom and justice becomes a monetary exchange.

So I’ll tell you: Here, around midday, without taking me by surprise, I heard the messenger (also a prisoner and in charge of delivering the permits to go see the judges). He shouted my name and I knew then that I would be receiving news from the Fourth Criminal Court, that they had issued a new sentence. I was given the news in the dock of the 32nd Court. I suppose the one who read me the ruling – he didn’t identify himself – was a secretary. I only saw him.

During a press conference on September 28, anarchist prisoners announced the beginning of an indefinite hunger strike. They are compañeros Fernando Bárcenas and Abraham Cortés, prisoners in North Prison, Luis Fernando Sotelo, prisoner in South Prison in Mexico City, and Miguel Peralta, prisoner in Cuicatlán Prison in Oaxaca. The strike is in rejection of the 33 year and five month sentence given to Luis Fernando Sotelo, to mark three years since the arrest of compañero Abraham Cortés on October 2, 2013, and in solidarity with the prison strike underway in the United States against the exploitation of prisoners’ labor and in support of the revolts against the killings of African-Americans by police in the U.S.

The three compas in Mexico City have gone on hunger strike, while Miguel will go on fasts.

Several significant events have unfolded during the past couple weeks in Mexico, from an end the teachers’ strike to the commemoration of major key dates for the resistance. As ever, the repression and impunity with which the Mexican state operates has continued unabated. There’s a lot to cover, so let’s jump right in.

Ayotzinapa

Protests in Chilpancingo, Guerrero on September 25.

On September 26, 2014, students from the Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Teachers’ College in Ayotzinapa, Guerrero were traveling to Mexico City to participate in the annual mobilization marking the October 2, 1968 Tlatelolco massacre. They were intercepted by state forces in Iguala, Guerrero, where police opened fire, killing six – three students and three passersby. Forty-three other students were disappeared and to this day their location and fate remain unknown.

On Tuesday, September 20, after one year and nine months of proceedings, our compañero Luis Fernando Sotelo Zambrano was given a sentence of 33 years and five months in prison and a fine of 519,815.25 pesos, for the crimes of attacks on public thoroughfares, first-degree attacks on public order, and first-degree destruction of private property.

This sentence is in line with the Mexican state’s policies of repression and criminalization, starting with Mexico City Mayor Miguel Ángel Mancera, who sought to condemn our compañero without any evidence and to place a ridiculous and disproportionate sentence on him.